Thank you for a great first season!

We finished our fourth and last week of the Austro-Israeli Expedition to Lachish. We continued our deep section next to our massive Late Bronze Age Phase S-3 building in Square C/9, uncovering more courses of the foundation, currently standing approximately 1.7 m high. Further, we were able to uncover wall remains of an even earlier phase, currently termed S-4. Pottery retrieved from baskets next to our new S-4 wall contained predominantly Late Bronze Age I pottery, but also occasional Middle Cypriot White Painted imports, Middle Bronze Age cooking pots and double handles, substantiating our expectation for Middle/Late Bronze Age transitional levels below. A younger pit in the C/9-C/8 baulk contained a broken capital similar to those found in the Egyptian Acropolis Temple. Lyndelle took last short-lived samples for radiocarbon analysis, which will be analyzed in September in Groningen in cooperation with Michael Dee.

We are thankful for four exciting weeks excavating at Tel Lachish. We are grateful to the Israel Antiquities Authority and its director Israel Hasson as well as to the Nature and Parks Authority and its chief archaeologist Tsvika Tsuk for their support and advice. We would also like to thank the former excavator of Tel Lachish David Ussishkin for his encouragement and company. Further, we felt honored by the interest and support of the Embassy of Israel to Austria and its Deputy Head of Mission Hadas Wittenberg Silverstein and the Austrian Embassy in Israel and its Ambassador Martin Weiss.

Special thanks go to Ilan Sharon from Hebrew University of Jerusalem for his advice and support of this project.

Further, we would like to acknowledge the hard work of all our staff and volunteers who stayed with us for our first season, we very much enjoyed having you around and we very much hope to welcome you back in the future.

Photos by Jellie to whom we are most grateful for his work and commitment!